Clandestine
by abcderika
Summary: She is the most colorful thing James has ever seen.


**Clandestine:** adj; characterized by, done in, or executed with secrecy or concealment, especially for purposes of subversion or deception; private or surreptitious.

--

She was the most colorful thing he had ever seen and he never wanted her to leave. She was hope, she was love, she was color, and she was alive. His dead eyes fed hungrily on her, on her being alive – her movement and excitement and talking and life. The opposite of him, poor, sad, small him. Sitting in the corner on an armchair, concealed by shadows and silence. Oh, how he wished he could be happy like her, be happy with himself and have people to talk to. But he was alone. He supposed it was better this way.

--

She was delicate and lovely and he loved it. Her legs were pale and thin under her skirt and her fingers, long and dainty. He liked this about her because it was everything he was not. He was harsh and corrupted and as good as dead; unwilling and uneventful. She was soft and innocent and so alive. She ate in the middle of the house table with her hair piled in a bun, loose strands falling out around her face as she raised her fork to her mouth. He watched from the far end of the table, no food on his sparkling plate and nobody around him, his skin pale and drawn over his cheekbones. He wanted to smoke. She made him miss everything he once had, which made him sad, which made him want to smoke. His past friends smoked recreationally – he did it therapeutically. Sure, it made his eyes sink, his skin sallow, his breath wheezy and his clothes smell, but it was worth the short time of freedom from himself.

--

"James!"

He didn't turn.

"James!"

It was a girl, why was she calling him?

"James," she panted as she reached his side. His eyes only flickered in her direction and he continued walking without as much as outwardly acknowledging her existence. She did not seem to find this type of behavior offensive and stared up at him with her wide eyes.

"I was just wondering how you were."

He stopped curiously. Why was she here? They had never talked for any length of time; before he was a prick and she, the same innocence personified. He turned to her, all sallow skin and tired limbs, sad and creaking and aching and tired, so tired.

"Why are you asking me?" he said, with a voice scratchy and jaw creaking from lack of use. She clutched her bag and continued to flicker her eyes over his face. He felt as if she was seeing everything he had done right through his skin. His eyes stared back impassively at her warm face and fiery hair.

"I'm getting along," he answered when she gave no reply, no emotion betrayed in his voice. She didn't look convinced, he noted with a slight feeling of disappointment, although he had been waiting for the day when someone noticed he wasn't getting along. She came to him, and today might turn out to be that day.

The skeptical look that she had in her eyes did not spread to the rest of her face or persona, but he knew it was there. Spending so much time alone had made him improve the way he read people's emotions from their faces. She seemed to relax a little and tilted her head to the side, considering him.

"I know," she sighed, her breath tickling his bare arms. She took another minute to observe him, raking her eyes over his prominent collarbones and thin neck and unruly hair. He really, really needed a smoke.

Suddenly her hand stretched out out out and took his cold fingers into her palm and pressed them there, as if she was trying to press life and loveliness into them. "I want to talk to you," she said earnestly, but in a way that meant their present conversation was over, and as quickly as it had come the warmth from her hand was gone and his fingers were once again limp by his side, and she had vanished down the corridor, leaving him one again concealed by shadows and silence.

--

The cold air swept through his hair as he sagged against a wall. Too much, too much, just too much excitement for one day and his nerves were shot, gone. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a joint, carelessly rolled but cautiously handled. Cradling it between fingers, he pulled out a Muggle lighter and click, click, clicked it until flame appeared, the brought it to the joint's end. He breathed in deep, flooding his lungs with smoke and good feelings. Sliding down the wall, he tipped his head back and let the smoke back out out out into the night air. He felt relaxed and felt his soul unclench and his brain release. It felt good. He forgot about her and about his parents and about his teachers looking discreetly at him during class. He forgot about it all and just sat.

--

He sat alone in the back corner of the room, it's just how it was. He'd sit and watch, watch everything that happened, from Alice Williams' foot tapping a beat into the floor to Peter Pettigrew's showing socks in row three. He was tired today, but he supposed that was considered normal for him. He had barely settled his back against the hard chair when there was a flurry of movement to his immediate right. His head jerked towards it as Lily arranged her books on the table in front of them, her uniform shirt clean and white and hurting his eyes. He shut them, brow furrowed, mind whirring and without answers. She finished arranging her things and turned to him, _damn_ those wide eyes, looking so innocently at his pale face. She smiled when he looked back.

"Hello, James." Simple. It was always simple with her and yet so complicated. She was like that. His mouth twitched in return, almost in the imitation of a smile, but he had forgotten how. She took it pleasantly, as always. She slid him a piece of parchment. "Do you have a quill?"

Of course he didn't, he didn't have anything except himself anymore. He responded to her with his eyes. She slipped a quill on top of the parchment and placed an inkwell between them. He stared unbelievingly at the items, then back at her, and she just smiled and began writing as the teacher talked.

--

He did have a conscience, it just wasn't functioning right then. All he knew was that she was beautiful and lovely and kept appearing around him. He liked it. He wondered why she, of all people, kept approaching him, of all people. He wondered why he didn't scare her away. She approached him again, subtly this time, in the hall after lunch. He was walking slowly, cushioning his tender limbs. She came up to him from the front and placed a hand delicately on his chest to stop his progression. The warmth permeated his shirt and burned his skin. She rested it there for a moment more, feeling his ribs through the thin material, then took her hand back and pierced him with her eyes.

"Come with me?" she asked, but he knew it wasn't a question. He followed.

--

**Author's Note:** Please let me know if you think I should continue writing 'Clandestine' as a further developed one-shot or a full-length collection of chapters. I won't constantly beg for reviews, I just need a few opinions and advice.  
_--erika_


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